[LURKERS] PB27 Map & Lurking: Walking in a :weed: wonderland

[scooter]

What is completely insane about boak is that Chesterton is better protected than his capital.

Clearly, Boak was just not expecting an attack from Adrien, and once it did come, the Chesterton force was simply too far to bother bringing it back.

Bacchus is dead-on of course, but this phenomenon happens a lot, and it always seems to frustrate players in the position that Gavagi is in right now. There's really nothing a player in Boak's position can do but defend the cities he has units near and just futilely do his best on the other front. It sucks, but Gavagi isn't entitled to a lighter garrison just because the other side got piled on after the fact.

Of course, Gavagi did decide to fight a land war against then-Krill-with-a-pop-edge instead of picking on the wealth of nearby softer targets, so he kinda got what he deserved here. Never fight a tech-equal land war against a competent opponent and all. The fact that someone else capitalized on a dogpile opportunity is just good play by them.

[Old Harry]

Wasn't it Krill who initiated hostilities to stop Gav getting too much of Tsargon? I don't remember either side discussing the choice though, I think they both just presented it as a fait accompli.

Whichever way it was probably the decision that ruined both of their games - if Krill had gone for Astro (which I'm sure he was talking about doing) or one of his other neighbours rather than playing great artist chicken with Gavagai he'd probably have been better off, and if Gav could have just finished Tsargon quickly and focused on his next meal he'd be a contender...

[TheHumanHydra]

Yeah, Krill started it. He may have discussed why in his videos, but I can't remember in how much detail.

[Mardoc]

IIRC, Gav was the one who declared war, Krill was just ('just') hovering on Gav's new borders with 20 HA and a Great Artist and settling aggressive cities. I think Krill's reasoning was something about keeping Gav from getting borders with HAK and Adrien, so that those could be Krill-food instead of Gav-food. Basically both of them wanted to get 2/3 of Tsargon's land, and neither was willing to blink.

I don't quite understand why Krill preferred to push Gav as a stepping stone to conquering HAK, rather than just going directly for HAK, though.

[scooter]

Yeah, they definitely took themselves mostly out of contention with that sequence, but either of them could have de-escalated it by just accepting a city or two less and eating somebody else.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Yeah, they definitely took themselves mostly out of contention with that sequence, but either of them could have de-escalated it by just accepting a city or two less and eating somebody else.

This is it, 100%. Two large, powerful neighbors can coexist peacefully. Just leave a handful of crumple zone cities with non-threatening garrisons and let your large army do its work elsewhere. A competent player would (or should) know that aggression against a non-aggressive but powerful neighbor will meet with limited gains initially and then end in a mire of blood and tears for both sides with the omnipresent "meanwhile, across the map" situation where yet another opponent steams ahead unencumbered. Both Krill and Gav ought to have been able to see this but instead chose to square off in a rooster fight over a middling 2-3 cities. Trust and reliance on mutual benefit among relative equals is a much cheaper defensive strategy and provides a much greater return on investment for your army. It is a calculated risk, but you have to take chances to win.

One problem with the above is that both players are ruthless and so could have decided to punish the weak border garrison anyway with the result being what actually occurred,mutual bloodbath, just with a few less cities to defend for the player who tried to trust the other. But the short term gain only buys a permanent enemy when otherwise it could have been a cheap border to defend and more neighbors to consume elsewhere.

[Commodore]

Ironically, though, it would have taken *both* being different people. A hypothetical NotKrill still couldn't really trust a Gav, nor could a hypothetical NotGav trust a Krill.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

I guess there is something to be said for building a different sort of reputation.

[Ruff_Hi]

Has this game died? No updates for ages.

[Gawdzak]

Has this game died? No updates for ages.

I don't think so. Just the turn pace has been slow I think.